Google started funding the IT training program in Gaza a couple years ago after a chance meeting with Andy Dwonch. Dwonch is Mercy Corps' director of social innovations and previously ran Mercy Corps' work in the West Bank and Gaza.

"From the very beginning I thought there could be some potential partnership, but I really frankly didn't understand what made Google tick," Dwonch says. "I didn't necessarily understand what they were interested in."

Ultimately, Google's foundation funded a two-year program of training and support for Palestinians in Gaza who wanted to start their own Web businesses or learn skills to hire themselves out as programmers to companies anywhere.

Google has offices in a Tel Aviv skyscraper and just off the beach in the northern Israeli city of Haifa. Google employs a couple hundred Israeli engineers and looks for Israeli companies to buy. Google knows the territory, but Israel's Foreign Ministry thinks the company is misguided in its latest move.

"Google can do anything they want. They're not a diplomatic entity so they can do Google La-la Land if they want to and that's fine," says Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor. "Still, the question remains, this is a highly sensitive international politics issue, so what made Google decide they wanted to take a position on this?"

Google wouldn't talk about this, but the company put out a statement saying it was following the lead of the United Nations and other international organizations. It also provided several examples of other name changes.

"I can tell you that it has no diplomatic meaning, and it hasn't," says Palmor. "But if people on the Palestinian side believe that they can get anything they want through unilateral steps by international bodies, well in that case they will be more reluctant to talk to Israel."

Ordinary Palestinians don't get to make that call. But as boys laugh and play online shooter games in an Internet café in the Palestinian city of Bethlehem in the West Bank, café owner Johnnie Skafi says Google pulled his "would-be nation" one more step up the ladder.

"Palestinian Territories means under the occupation," Skafi says. "Palestine [means] without occupation. That's what I think is the difference."

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Transcript

AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:

Last month, Guatemala became the latest country to recognize Palestine as a sovereign nation. The Internet giant Google obviously isn't a country, but it's done something similar. The webpage Google.ps used to read Google Palestinian territories. On May 1, the company quietly changed the regional search page to say Google Palestine.

As NPR's Emily Harris reports, Google is already involved economically in both Israel and Palestinian areas and changing the name is seen, by both sides, as a political move.

EMILY HARRIS, BYLINE: Google didn't announce the name change, but it didn't have to. Palestinians noticed right away.

MOHAMMAD KUMBOZ: Everybody knows about it, and they were so happy. Everybody screenshot, post on Facebook. Yay, Google, thank you.

HARRIS: Mohammad Kumboz is a 22-year-old graphic designer and computer programmer who lives in the Gaza Strip. He knows having Google call Gaza and the West Bank Palestine isn't as official as, say, the United Nations, which, over Israeli and U.S. objections, recognized Palestine as a nonmember observer state last fall. But Kumboz says Google's move is more meaningful.

KUMBOZ: Google means a lot to us. There is no day passing without using Google.

HARRIS: That might be especially true for him. Kumboz is part of Gaza Sky Geeks, an incubator for nascent IT businesses. It was started by Mercy Corps and is funded by a $900,000 grant from Google's charitable arm. So far, Kumboz has developed a game called Mighty Cow in which players help save a rather sweet-looking cow from the butcher's knife.

Google started funding the IT training program in Gaza a couple of years ago after a chance meeting with Andy Dwonch. Dwonch is Mercy Corps' director of social innovations.

ANDY DWONCH: From the very beginning, I thought there could be some potential partnership. But I really, you know, frankly didn't understand what made Google tick. I didn't necessarily understand what they were interested in.

HARRIS: Ultimately, Google the foundation funded a two-year program of training and support for Palestinians in Gaza who wanted to start their own Web businesses or learn skills to hire themselves out as programmers to companies anywhere.

Google the company has offices in a Tel Aviv skyscraper and just off the beach in Haifa. Google employs a couple hundred Israeli engineers and looks for Israeli companies to buy. All this to say Google knows the territory around here, and Israel's Foreign Ministry thinks the company should have known better than to identify contested land as a state. Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor.

YIGAL PALMOR: Google can do, as I said, anything they want. Since they're not a diplomatic entity, they can do Google la-la land if they want to, and that's fine, that's cool. Still, the question remains, this is a highly sensitive international politics issue. So, you know, what made Google decide they want to take a position on this?

HARRIS: Google wouldn't talk about this, but the company put out a statement saying it was following the lead of the United Nations and other international organizations. It also provided several examples of other name changes, but none wherein as ambiguous a position as Palestine.

PALMOR: I can tell you that it has no diplomatic meaning, and it hasn't. But if people on the Palestinian side believe that they can get anything they want through unilateral steps by international bodies, well, in that case, they will be more reluctant to talk to Israel.

HARRIS: Ordinary Palestinians don't get to make that call. But as boys laugh and play online shoot'em up games at an Internet cafe in famous Bethlehem, cafe owner Johnnie Skafi says Google pulled his would-be nation one more step up the ladder.

JOHNNIE SKAFI: Palestinian territories, which mean is under the occupation. Palestine, it's - that without occupation. That's what we - I think that it is the difference.

HARRIS: The difference of one word or one country? Emily Harris, NPR News, Jerusalem.